


Like Every Fairy Tale They Ever Told

by antumbral



Category: Gymnastics RPF, Olympics RPF, Sports RPF
Genre: Gen, Olympic fic, USA Gymnastics, that time when US men were the scrappy underdogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-14 23:52:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/842872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antumbral/pseuds/antumbral
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time, the US men weren't expected to medal. They did. No ever one predicted it, and no one ever told them happily ever after could feel like this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Every Fairy Tale They Ever Told

The bruises don’t start to show up on his biceps or his thighs until the morning after, which is nice because it means he can spend the whole night celebrating. Raj and Justin lead the team out to one of the Olympic village clubs; considering that the Games are the world’s largest gathering of body-conscious athletes, they consume a remarkable amount of alcohol every night.  


The club is dark and loud: bodies packed tight and swaying in the universal language of dance. Speakers pound out house techno with a European flair, some Amsterdam DJ that he’d probably recognize if he’d spent more than a stop-over in Amsterdam between international circuit meets. The dance floor isn’t so much lit as it is occasionally laser-swept, and the only other light in the room comes from above the bar, where the bartenders have to be able to see the bottles.  


He has a girl back home, so he fends off a few drunken advances from one girl he recognizes as a swimmer and another who mentions something to do with arrows, and instead takes a seat in front of the bar, ordering water and sipping carefully. Justin seems to have made it a personal mission to accumulate as many girls as possible, and is on his way to adding a fifth to his retinue. He’s not a bad dancer, and Jon finds himself content to perch on his stool by the bar and watch. Kevin elbows his way over next to Justin, visible mostly by the path that he clears around himself. That’s one advantage of the stool; he doesn’t feel short when sitting down, even when the gargantuan track-and-field runners dance past.   


Raj, David, and Joey aren’t as easy to see as Justin, and it takes him a minute to spot them across the room among all the other movement. They’ve staked out a little corner to themselves and are dancing as a group, mostly oblivious to the girls who would cut in. Joey is laughing, head thrown way back and huge grin, teeth eerily purple-white under the club’s blacklight effect. None of those three can dance with half the grace that Justin manages, but they don’t care and they’re having fun, so that’s what matters.   


The only one he can’t see is Sasha, and it doesn’t really surprise him. Sasha never really struck him as a party type of guy, and Jon had frankly been surprised when he’d agreed to go on to the club with them after dinner. He might have even gone back to the hotel already, especially if he found someone to go back there with. Sasha seemed like the type who’d prefer privacy, and since he was rooming with Kevin, he could be reasonably certain that his roomie wouldn’t be back before dawn.   


Jon feels a tap at his shoulder and pivots on his bar stool. It's Sasha, who obviously hasn’t gone home and who instead signals the bartender for a water of his own. Sasha turns his head and says something, but Jon can’t hear him over the din of the music and people, so he cocks his head to the side and taps his ear. Sasha nods and leans in closer, so that his mouth is near enough to Jon’s ear that Jon can only see him in bits and pieces, distorted in peripheral vision.  


“I said, you looked like you were brooding,” Sasha yells over the noise. Jon chuckles and takes another sip of water, then leans over to talk directly in Sasha’s ear.  


“Nah. I was just watching the boys. Haley would wring my neck if I got out there in that meat market.”  


Sasha nods and drags another stool over to sit on, then leans back over so Jon can hear him. “I just didn’t want to get too worked up before the event. I figured you were running routines in your head or something, you looked so focused over here.”   


“Nah. I actually was wondering how long it’d take that girl to get Joey to realize she’s trying to pick him up.” Sasha scans the crowd, and Jon points over to the corner where Raj and David are ribbing Joey. It takes a minute, but Jon can see the exact moment when Sasha finally spots his teammates. His face relaxes and takes on an unconscious grin. When he turns back to Jon, he grins even wider, and Jon can’t help but grin back.   


He keeps the smile as he glances back out, just enough to watch Justin shimmy his hips twice and press up closer to the girl he's dancing with.  


“Hey,” says Sasha, and Jon turns back to him, still smiling. “We’re Olympic bronze medalists.” Hearing someone say it out loud brings back the giddiness of the very first moment he'd known, and with Sasha's smile it seems so true and so deep and so perfect that they're both laughing, for no reason at all.   


Sasha finishes his water and sets the glass behind him on the bar. “You want to go back to the hotel and get some sleep for tomorrow?” Jon glances back at the dance floor: Kevin, Justin, Joey, Raj and David all there and all in their own ways completely, uniquely happy.   


“Nah. I’m going to stay here and wait for the guys.” Sasha nods and orders another water, settling in to wait too. Jon arches back against the bar and can’t keep the silly smile off his face. It's a little like being drunk really, giddy and high with no alcohol at all. Those are his boys out there having the time of their lives. They're the bronze medalists and not even the Chinese had been as happy to be on the podium as his boys. It's a head rush, and a power trip, and completely humbling, and stupefyingly impossible all at the same time. It's a feeling so good he wishes he could bottle it, and even though he knows he’ll feel that rings routine in the morning, somehow things have never been so right with his world.   


He leans back over to Sasha. “Hey. We’re Olympic bronze medalists,” he shouts, and Sasha laughs so hard he snorts water up his nose.   



End file.
